Today's newest Bracketology from ESPN shows five Big East teams in the field with Georgetown holding the crown of First Team Out. It feels like six is a lot of teams from a 10 team conference, but filling the field isn't league dependant. If those are the best teams, those are the best teams. Could the Big East get seven? Doesn't seem likely, does it? Less than four weeks to go to find out....
Tuesday, February 18: #9 Villanova at Providence (6pm Central, Fox Sports 1) - Soooooo.... about Sunday night.... As I write this, I'm listening to the CBS Sports Eye on College Basketball podcast, and Matt Norlander says that because of Nova's losses - At Syracuse and two poleaxings at the hands of Creighton - he has no idea what to make of the Wildcats. Providence has already popped Creighton in the nose in the Dunkin' Donuts Center, why couldn't they do the same thing to Villanova?
Wednesday, February 19: #11 Creighton at Marquette (7pm Central, Fox Sports 1) - As we discussed on Sunday, Marquette's still a long way from thinking about the NCAA tournament, but Creighton's the next stair on the climb. As Cracked Sidewalks pointed out earlier today, Marquette defended Creighton pretty well the first time around. Who will win the battle of adjustments, Greg McDermott or Buzz Williams?
Saturday, February 22: Xavier at Georgetown (10:30 am Central, Fox Sports 1) - Xavier's lost four of six right now, and Georgetown had a four game winning streak smacked to a stop by St. John's on Sunday night. Both teams have a mid-week game before this one, but it's still a tangle between two teams that would like to think of themselves as NCAA tournament worthy.
Big East Women's Basketball Game of the Week
Sunday, February 23: #22 St. John's at Creighton (2pm Central, Fox Sports 1) - The Red Storm have already locked up a bye to the quarterfinals in the Big East tournament. Going to third place Creighton is no joke, though (undefeated at home, four wins by 14 or more points in league play), and I'm sure that the Bluejays remember their 19 point loss in Queens back on January 8th.
The Worst American Athletic Conference Game of the Week
Saturday, February 22: UCF at Houston (1pm Central, ESPN News) - I automatically disqualified Temple's games from this category this week following their home win over at the time #23 SMU. This is the only remaining game between the bottom five teams in the AAC right now, and honestly, Houston's not even that bad. UCF is, though, so that's all that matters. As is a near tradition around these parts, this game will be on ESPN News. ESPN3 is the Watch ESPN channel, so does that make ESPNU ESPN4? Does ESPN News qualify as ESPN5? Is that where the AAC ranks on ESPN's radar?